Markedly Delayed Night Blindness Due to Vitamin A Insufficiency Secondary to Bowel Resection

Vitamin A is a fat-soluble vitamin absorbed by the small intestine either as retinol or carotene, depending on the dietary source. Carotene is converted to retinol which is then esterified to retinyl palmitate and stored in the liver where it is available for metabolic requirements. Vitamin A is mandatory for vision, being the chromophore of visual pigments. Vitamin A combines with the opsins in rods and cones and mediates the transformation of photic energy into electrochemical messages [1, 2].